Regions

A Nation of Emigrants: How Mexico Manages Its Migration

Dietrich Thränhardt, Professor of Comparative Politics and Migration research at the University of Münster, reviews A Nation of Emigrants. How Mexico Manages Its Migration and StrugglingforRecognition.TheAlevi MovementinGermanyandinTransnationalSpace. The first book is about Mexican policy changes in response to the United States’ increasingly restrictive border policies. The author writes that both the Mexican government and Catholic Church treated the Mexican migrants with a positive attitude, offering dual citizenship and praising them as heroes rather than traitors. This is largely a result of a loss of control over migration for both the Mexican government and church.

The second piece that Thränhardt examines, Struggling for Recognition for Recognition. The Alevi Movement in Germany and in Transnational Space, details the Alevi community, which in the 1960s began migrating to Germany from Turkey, where they were forced to practice their religion secretly and away from the Turkish government. In the late 1980s and early 1990s, the community found its political voice in the midst of German cultural pluralism. As the community emerged from the shadows in Germany, it publicly opposed Turkey’s traditional Sunni norms. In this, Thränhardt draws the distinction between Mexican migrants in the United States who still maintain close ties to the home country and the Alevi community of Germany, who now proudly identify separately from their traditional homeland of Turkey.

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